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Brussels: Tesla is waging an intensive pressure campaign across Europe to win regulatory approval for its “Full Self-Driving” (FSD) technology, and the effort appears to be yielding results, according to a special investigative report published by Reuters on Wednesday.
The US electric vehicle maker has sought to portray European safety regulators as slow-moving bureaucrats standing in the way of technology it describes as life-saving. Tesla markets the system as “Full Self-Driving (Supervised),” acknowledging that it still requires the full attention of a human driver. The company has described European approval as central to the future of its business and to regaining market share on the continent, where it faces growing competition from Chinese electric vehicle manufacturers.
The campaign has gained momentum since the Netherlands approved the system in April. Seven other EU member states have since authorised FSD within their own borders ahead of a full EU-level vote, bringing the total to eight countries. On Wednesday, Germany also announced its support for EU-wide approval, prompting Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk to publicly thank the German government. However, the EU vote, originally expected in October, has been postponed until at least December while some member states conduct additional testing.
As part of its lobbying effort, Tesla produced what it called an “evidence dashboard” on FSD safety, which it said was shared with member-state regulators in April. Independent traffic-safety researchers who reviewed the company’s methodology for Reuters concluded that Tesla’s own study offers no credible evidence that the system prevents fatal crashes, a claim central to its European campaign. An earlier Reuters investigation in May found that Tesla had used unsound statistical methods to assert that FSD is up to ten times safer than a human driver.
The report also cited correspondence between Tesla and the Dutch vehicle authority, RDW, indicating that the company frequently sought to set the terms of the safety review and pushed back against certain questions raised by the regulator. Experts expressed concern that the collaborative tone of the exchanges could raise questions about regulatory impartiality.
Mr. Musk has openly urged European customers to press regulators for approval, at one point likening communication with European authorities to a Kafka novel. When French Transport Minister Philippe Tabarot voiced safety reservations in July, Mr. Musk warned that approval delays would cost lives, after which Tesla supporters flooded officials’ social media accounts and sent protest letters to transport authorities in Sweden and Norway. Following a video conference with Mr. Musk last month, Mr. Tabarot adopted a markedly more favourable stance, stating that France was working closely toward supporting approval. The French transport ministry did not explain the shift when approached by Reuters.
Not all regulators have been swayed. Stein-Helge Mundal, a senior engineer at the Norwegian Public Roads Administration, said his agency would not be influenced by public sentiment, stating: “We do not approve systems because they are popular.” He added that the name “Full Self-Driving” risks leading drivers to overestimate the system’s capabilities, and that Norwegian authorities regard claims about lives saved as marketing rather than evidence.
Under current EU motor-vehicle regulations, hands-free automated driving systems such as FSD are permitted only on highways and are prohibited on more congested urban roads. Tesla is seeking a special exemption from these rules, and the outcome of the forthcoming EU vote is expected to shape the future of automated driving technology across the bloc.
